All pleasant things must come to an ending. "Katy," said Mrs. Ashe, one afternoon in early February, "I heard some ladies talking just now in the _salon_, and they said that Rome is filling up very fast. The Carnival begins in less than two weeks, and everybody wants to be there then. If we don't make haste, we shall not be able to get any rooms." "Oh dear!" said Katy, "it is very trying not to be able to be in two places at once. I want to see Rome dreadfully, and yet I cannot bear to leave Sorrento. We have been very happy here, haven't we?" So they took up their wandering staves again, and departed for Rome, like the Apostle, "not knowing what should befall them there." CHAPTER IX. A ROMAN HOLIDAY. "Oh dear!" said Mrs. Ashe, as she folded her letters and laid them aside, "I wish those Pages would go away from Nice, or else that the frigates were not there." "Why! what's the matter?" asked Katy, looking up from the many-leaved journal from Clover over which she was poring. "Nothing is the matter except that those everlasting people haven't gone to Spain yet, as they said they would, and Ned seems to keep on seeing them," replied Mrs. Ashe, petulantly. "But, dear Polly, what difference does it make? And they never did promise you to go on any particular time, did they?" "N-o, they didn't; but I wish they would, all the same. Not that Ned is such a goose as really to care anything for that foolish Lilly!" Then she gave a little laugh at her own inconsistency, and added, "But I oughtn't to abuse her when she is your cousin." "Don't mention it," said Katy, cheerfully. "But, really, I don't see why poor Lilly need worry you so, Polly dear." The room in which this conversation took place was on the very topmost floor of the Hotel del Hondo in Rome. It was large and many-windowed; and though there was a little bed in one corner half hidden behind a calico screen, with a bureau and washing-stand, and a sort of stout mahogany hat-tree on which Katy's dresses and jackets were hanging, the remaining space, with a sofa and easy-chairs grouped round a fire, and a round table furnished with books and a lamp, was ample enough to make a good substitute for the private sitting-room which Mrs. Ashe had not been able to procure on account of the near approach of the Carnival and the consequent crowding of strangers to Rome. In fact, she was assured that under the circumstances she was lucky in finding rooms as good as these; and she made the most of the assurance as a consolation for the somewhat unsatisfactory food and service of the hotel, and the four long flights of stairs which must be passed every time they needed to reach the dining-room or the street door.